War of words breaks out in horse meat debacle

Linda O'Reilly & Paul Neilan A war of words has broken out between two County Monaghan based companies at the heart of the horse meat debacle. Newbliss-based McAdam Foods, which was yesterday identified by the Department of Agriculture as a potential link in the chain of its investigation into how equine DNA came to be in beef burger products, has disputed the volume of beef that it supplied to Ballybay-based Silvercrest Foods. McAdam Foods was supplying raw materials for use in production to a number of companies at the heart of the controversy Silvercrest in Ballybay, Rangleland Foods in Castleblayney and Freeza Meats in Newry. While Martin McAdam has conceded that there was "clearly an issue" with their Polish supplier after a consignment was found to contain 80% horse meat, he said that the company had "no awareness or knowledge whatsoever" of there being equine content in meat products imported and supplied by McAdam to other companies. In the latest statement from McAdam Foods on the issue, the company disputes that it supplied 170 tonnes of beef to Silvercrest in 2012, as claimed by ABP yesterday. Saying this was "totally incorrect", McAdam Foods claims that invoices to Silvercrest Foods show that McAdam supplied the company with 110 tonnes of Irish pork last year and 60 tonnes of imported frozen polish beef. "If ABP bought 18,000 tonnes of beef in total in 2012 (as stated), the 60 tonnes of beef products supplied by McAdam Foods makes up 0.003% of that volume," the statement from McAdam reads. It continues: "It is our understanding that the policy and practice of the ABP Silvercrest plant is to use supplied products within three days. "The last delivery by McAdam Foods to Silvercrest was on 13/11/12. The presence of Equine DNA was identified at ABP in January. "McAdam Foods has all necessary documents and information to hand in this entire matter and is co-operating fully and willingly with the authorities." McAdam Foods also stated that ABP Silvercrest was made "entirely aware" of the origin of product supplied. The Polish suppliers involved have been identified to the Irish authorities by McAdam Foods as 'Foodservice' and 'Mipol'. Martin McAdam of McAdam Food has said he is co-operating fully with the Department of Agriculture and the Food Standards Agency in Ireland (FSAI) and has provided them with documentation. An earlier statement read: "The company, its management and staff are shocked and astonished to discover that equine content has been identified in products which have been imported and supplied through McAdam Foods." McAdam Foods claims that any such products were bought and imported on the basis of their being ordered, documented, labelled and understood to be beef "and nothing else". The company has supplied all such labels and documentation to inspectors of the Department of Agriculture and the FSAI. Investigations by gardaí Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney told an Oireachtas committee hearing on the contamination of beef burgers with horse meat that if there is fraudulent activity going on, it will be detected by the gardaí. Investigations are under way by gardaí and the special investigations unit at the Department of Agriculture. Meanwhile, the Chief Executive of the FSAI has stressed that the Polish authorities had not formally come back to the Irish food authorities. Rangeland Meanwhile, production remains suspended at Rangeland Foods in Castleblayney after tests found 75% horse DNA in an ingredient imported from Poland. The Department of Agriculture has asked for Garda assistance at a national level in its investigations into how horse meat DNA came to contaminate Irish beef but, it is understood, that gardaí in Cavan or Monaghan have not yet been involved in that investigation. A statement from the company, which employs 80 reads: "Rangeland Foods, Castleblayney, has temporarily suspended production of beef following the interception of beef from Poland, which tested positive for equine DNA. This consignment was received in early January and did not go into production. "Upon receiving these results Rangeland immediately reported the matter to the Department of Agriculture. "Rangeland has now temporarily suspended production to permit a full investigation - 90 per cent of Rangeland's beef usage is of Irish origin." Rangeland supplies burgers to Supermac's fast food chain as well as other fast food restaurants and the food service industry. Supermac's managing director Pat McDonagh said the product in question bore no relevance to Supermac's burgers, which were "fully traceable back to the farm and DNA tested to prove that it is 100 per cent Irish beef". Silvercrest The total in lost contracts at Silvercrest as a result of the scandal is thought to be around €60 million. They lost multi-million contracts for Tesco, Aldi, The Co-op and Burger King - Tesco alone was worth €15m. Silvercrest is owned by beef baron Larry Goodman's ABP company, which has a plant in Poland, however, that plant is not involved in the equine DNA investigation. A spokesperson for the company, which employs 112, would not comment on the future for jobs at the plant. ABP CEO Paul Finnerty is expecting a letter asking him to appear tomorrow (Thursday) in the Oireachtas committee on the matter, which a spokesman said "will be carefully considered". Mr Finnerty said of the discovery: "We have learnt important lessons from this incident and we are determined to ensure that this never happens again. "We have already implemented total management change at the Silvercrest facility - which remains closed... We have put in place new procedures to audit all our third party suppliers. We have also established comprehensive DNA testing procedures - we will become an industry leader in this area."